We registered a company in Odesa and got a license for employment mediation abroad

In February of 2019, we had a client who turned to us, a ship management company from the Netherlands. This company was planning to recruit seamen both, for their own ships and those under their management. They needed a crewing company in Ukraine specialized in recruiting seamen for convenient recruiting. According to the client, it had to be their subsidiary based in Odesa.

The client was advised on the following:

• What is required from a Dutch company to register a subsidiary in Ukraine;
• What is required to arrange crewing activities;
• Whether or not it is possible to get a turnkey crewing company in Odesa. 

How to register a subsidiary in Ukraine

To register a company in Ukraine founded by a foreign company the latter must submit the following:

• Certificate of incorporation of such company in its country. This may be an extract from the trade, court or other register, which records business entities of the respective country. This document must be duly certified by its issuing authority and, depending on the country of incorporation, validated or apostilled;
• Power of Attorney to represent such company in Ukraine and act on its behalf.

Before the start of partnership with the foreign company, we made sure to check the nature of international relations between our countries as this influences the entire process of interaction between the companies. Have there been any international agreements signed on mutual recognition of documents? Has the country where the founder is registered signed the Hague Convention that cancels the requirement to legalize official foreign documents?  

As our client’s company was incorporated in the Netherlands, which country is a signatory to the above Convention, submitting an apostilled extract from the Dutch Chamber of Commerce was enough.

The Power of Attorney authorizing our employees to act on behalf of the company, whose text we had prepared on our own, also had to be apostilled.

It was decided to register a limited liability company for the client.

What is required to organize crewing activities of an existing company?

Organizing crewing activities in Ukraine requires obtaining a license for agency in overseas recruitment.

Of course, crewing is a highly specialized activity focused on employing only seamen and only on ships. However, this activity is covered by the above license.

In this case, a standard set of documents usually submitted to obtain the above license must be complemented with details of the ship owned or legally used by the foreign employer.

Results of our work

After some consultations between our company and the client, we signed an agreement on registering a limited liability company in the name of the client and obtaining a license for agency in overseas recruitment.  

We also made it clear to the client that if they were in a hurry to commence their activities, we might organize a streamlined procedure, to which the client provided their consent. Two weeks after we had received the required documents from the client (apostilled extract from the Chamber of Commerce and Power of Attorney), their company was registered, obtained the relevant license and was turn-key ready.